Strategy for Supply
As the result of predicted interest in the MB-326 and better than predicted interest in the CL-215 at the 1964 ILA Airshow, a strategy had to be developed to supply the demands. Canadair and Aermacchi could not fill all the orders on their own.
A former Aermacchi executive:
"In 1964 it was only ourselves and Canadair producing the MB-326. In Italy, we had been testing the CL-215 extensively and had refined it to the point of building some pre-production models that would be ready for the Paris Airshow in June of 1965. We were also developing a utility version of the aircraft that did away with the water bomber capacity in favour of a multi-use cabin. We hoped the prototype for that would also be ready for Paris in 1965.
In 1964, the only other company with a license to produce the MB-326 was Atlas Aircraft of South Africa. They had not yet started production, but it didn't really matter. With the Apartheid government that was in place there at the time, very few places indeed would buy from them and their variant of the aircraft would be very specialised to their own needs.
At the ILA 1964 show, Commonwealth Aircraft of Australia, along with Embraer of Brazil and FMA of Argentina all showed interest in obtaining licences to produce the MB-326. Additionally, all three companies showed greater or lesser degrees of interest in obtaining licenses to produce the CL-215.
Before 1964 was out, we had granted a license for the MB-326 to Commonwealth Aircraft and a team was sent from Canadair to the Commonwealth facilities to oversee the tooling up process.
Supplying the license for the MB-326 to Embraer and FMA was more problematic as we felt we didn't need two full production lines for the aircraft in South America. We suggested that one could hold the license and be the main production/assembly line while the other could be subcontracted by them for production of certain components.
We could tell they weren't happy with our suggestion, but nobody had any better ideas for how both companies could get themselves involved in the production of the aircraft.
Ultimately, we gave the license to Embraer in early 1965 and they subcontracted FMA to produce the landing gear and wingtip fuel tanks along with the rear fuselage and empanage.
What really tipped the scales in Embraer's favour was their higher interest in the CL-215 than FMA seemed to have. Shortly after granting the license, Aermacchi sent teams to both Embraer and FMA facilities to supervise tooling up for the MB-326."
A former Canadair executive:
"It was a tremendous relief to us in Cartierville when we heard there would be another production line for the MB-326 in the Americas. We were stretched to fill the Central American orders, we had no idea how we could stretch to South America as well.
The challenge was determining where the line would be for us and Embraer. We were already delivering the MB-326 fleet to Guatemala, but had made no deliveries south of there yet.
After some bargaining, we agreed that Embraer would have the markets from the Honduras-Nicaragua border southward. We agreed on this as the first batch of Honduran aircraft was nearing completion at Cartierville. Any commitments Canadair had made for the MB-326 further south were transfered to Embraer.
We were really very eager to get the CL-215 production started in Canada now that the bulk of development had been taken care of in Italy. At the time, we were also deciding whether to expand the Cartiervile facilities or open another facility elsewhere to handle CL-215 production when the time came.
A former Commonwealth Aircraft executive:
"The ink was barely dry on our production license for the MB-326 when we were told by Aermacchi to actively pursue customers across Asia and Oceania.
Their idea was that Embraer would have South America, Canadair would cover North America and a good section of Western Europe, Aermacchi would focus on Mediterranean markets as well as any other potential customers in Africa or the Middle East. We would have what was left.
We already knew New Zealand was committed to the MB-326. Australia also had good relations with Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore; so we hoped we might find a customer for the aircraft among them as well.
As for the rest of Asia, we knew india was unlikely as they already had the domestically designed HAL Kiran trainer underway. As for the rest of the continent, we had no idea what to expect."
